Wall enclosures around athletic playing surfaces have heretofore been very popular, whether such wall enclosures define ice rinks, soccer fields, or the like.
Such wall enclosures have, in the past, been constructed of a variety of materials, including wooden frame members, which have been found to be undesirable since the wooden frame members are subject to damage due to moisture and temperature extremes in the case of outdoor rinks, as well as being costly to construct, particularly on site.
Accordingly, a number of interconnected dasher board panels suitable for ice hockey rinks, skating rinks and soccer fields have heretofore been proposed.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,905,970 teaches a dasher board system for athletic playing surfaces which includes inter-connected substantially identical dasher board sections employing in one embodiment a polyethylene facing panel backed by a plywood panel, supported by upright tubing sections anchored to perimeter concrete.
Moreover, U.S. Pat. No. 3,727,888 teaches a hockey rink board having panel sections standing end-to-end to form a wall around a hockey rink or the like where each panel has a central post for holding it upright and for pivoting it into alignment with similar panels to form a wall.
Moreover, U.S. Pat. No. 4,883,267 teaches an ice rink dasher board system having an adjustable shock absorbing mechanism for providing a desired degree of resiliency of the dasher board panels.
Moreover, U.S. Pat. No. 3,883,120 also shows a dasher board for skating rinks made entirely of fiberglass and having a smooth front portion with integrally formed border and a plurality of bolsters to provide rigidity.
These and other dasher board systems present relatively complicated structures. Moreover, many of the dasher board systems used heretofore present exposed clamping mechanisms such as bolts or the like, in order to clamp the shielding panels such as tempered glass or the like to the dasher board assemblies.
Furthermore, a number of clamping mechanisms have heretofore been proposed in order to clamp panels of glass.
For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,914,888 teaches a support frame for receiving and retaining a panel of glass as part of a wall or door assembly.
Moreover, U.S. Pat. No. 2,026,139 shows a mounting for a glass pane having a front clamping member, a back clamping member and a cam on the back clamping member co-acting with the front clamping member to draw the members towards each other into glass clamping relation.
Finally, U.S. Pat. No. 3,296,763 illustrates devices for removably locking panels in a framing.
It is an object of this invention to provide an improved dasher board system which is easy to construct and assemble. It is also an object of this invention to provide an improved clamping mechanism of the shielding panel which is hidden from view.
The broadest aspect of this invention relates to a dasher board assembly having a channel for receiving a shielding panel, and a rotatable cam co-operating with the channel to releasably clamp the shielding panel to the channel.
Another aspect of this invention relates to a dasher board assembly including: a lower frame having a bottom plate adapted to be anchored to the ground, a pair of spaced apart stringers at the upper end of the lower frame, the stringers including an upper and lower surface; a plurality of upstanding posts, each having a lower end connected to the bottom plate, and an upper end connected to said lower surface of said stringer; a U-shaped channel disposed between the stringers, the U-shaped channel presenting a first leg connected to one of said stringers, and a second movable leg; a tempered glass or shielding panel adapted to be releasably secured to the U-shaped channel; a rotatable cam disposed between the second leg of the U-shaped channel and the other stringer for co-operating with the second leg of the channel to releasably clamp the tempered glass between the first and second legs; a sill connected to the upper surface of the stringers to prevent access to the rotatable cam.